


phantasmagoria

by orphan_account



Category: Original Work
Genre: (sort of), Chilli Flakes, Death, Drugs, Gen, Love, Mental Health Issues, Nihilism, Original Fiction, Ramen, Refridgerators, Religion, Surreal, Tea, Technology, Windows - Freeform, sleeping, things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2020-01-12 21:41:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18455147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Excerpt:"I am sleeping. I am awake. I am not dreaming. Dreams are far stranger."God, this is terrible.





	phantasmagoria

I wake up each day to the homily of a skinny black-tied telephone. He believes most sincerely in my potential to reach total purity, as do I, as do all believers. All I must do is cut off my left breast, for it is superfluous anyway and rather unsightly. Or I must drink only mineral water, or write a novel, or vomit into someone else’s mouth. This morning, he’s entreating me to forgo caffeine. I admit that it sounds appealing; I don’t even like coffee. It tastes too much like afterparties and disappointment and rejection and... _And._ (The word's a bridge, a tunnel, and it's-- _and_ 's-- falling down, falling through.) Despite my willingness to part with lattes, I cannot give up tea, and I tell my phone this with honest regret. _Very well._ He tugs at the end of his sleeve, and I punch his buttons until he rests again. I walk now to the kitchen, open the refrigerator and step in. I close the door and jump into the plastic prism full of farfalle, whose triangular wings flap like a butterfly’s. I am tickled icy blue, not pink. Then I scrub my skin with soy sauce and emerge, dripping and sticky. 

I am still in bed as I do this all. I am whimpering like a lonely puppy. My mouth tastes like blood, if blood was made of monosodium glutamate and crumbling 99-cent pizzeria chili pepper flakes– and mine probably is; I eat too much instant ramen. I eat too much. I am too much. I am sleeping. I am awake. I am not dreaming. Dreams are far stranger. I kiss the pillow. It doesn’t reciprocate. Then again, who does? My pillow is too good for me. It wishes to be left alone. So I leave the bed, for real this time. I knock over last night’s mug of tea, which washes my foot, cleans me, jabs me with porcelain shards, and I swear as the heel of my foot parts a jasmine-colored sea. I cannot hear what I say, so I assume I've uttered every profanity simultaneously (every language and every syllable, a soiled kaleidoscopic tornado of filthy language) mixed together and leave it at that.

I look. I see. I gaze. The glass is on the floor. The window is broken. The house is whole. We do things that way, sometimes. (The hand is broken, the mouth is broken, the eyes are broken, but the girl is whole; she can still think and she can still write her words, if only in her own bile as her cough turns olive. The cuticle bleeds but the finger is still on the hand, so it’s like nothing happened at all, like it didn't even hurt. The tooth has been removed but the lips will pull over it. They will form words, just a little bit more painfully. They can still spit and kiss, and that’s all lips really need to know.) The door is open, and doors all ought to be open. Fuse them into the wall otherwise. I will do this. I will learn how to melt metal and freeze it. I will become a thief. I will become a savior. 

And now speak.


End file.
